Rights activists seek NAP’s implementation

LONDON: Campaigners have called on the government of Pakistan to implement the National Action Plan (NAP) without any further delay and end the bloodshed of Shias and others.
During two demonstrations outside Pakistan High Commission here on Sunday and Monday, members of Pakistan civil society and other organisations said that bomb blasts and killing of innocent people in Shikarpur and Hayyatabad had shown that terrorists remained strong and free to attack anyone they wished.
On Sunday, members of civil society and intellectuals gathered for three hours and chanted slogans against the lack of action by the government and demanded that hate preachers be brought to justice and an end put to the activists of banned sectarian groups and their masterminds.
They said that peaceful Pakistanis all over the world were “greatly saddened on the perpetual killings of Pakistani Shia worshippers” within two weeks, claiming lives of more than 85 innocent people. Speakers on this occasion said that it has been two months since attacks on Army Public School by terrorists and since then over 100 Pakistanis have been killed in sectarian and ethnic attacks. They said that it shall never be forgotten that terrorists are out to destroy Pakistan and all of them follow the same nihilistic ideology of hate and sectarianism and none of them must be treated softly.
On Monday, campaigners from Hazara International Forum of Great Britain and Hazara United Movement (HUM) organised a protest which was also attended by Pakhtoonkhawa Mili Awami Party leaders.
Hazara leaders said that Hazaras in Quetta continued to receive threats from terrorist groups but the authorities didn’t take action against members of the banned terror outfits who remain as active as before but under the guise of new groups. They said it was their belief that these groups and individuals couldn’t operate without help from the government at some level and “the complicity of Pakistani government officials cannot be ruled out”.
They said that Pakistan has 33 security and intelligent agencies but at the government level there is the “lack of will” to thwart such attacks.
Calling on the government to act firmly, they said the religious seminaries involved in glorifying and promoting terrorist activities must be permanently closed down and their proprietors be prosecuted. They said terrorism can end when foreign and local funding of the terrorists is stopped permanently and supporters of terrorism be prosecuted by the military courts.
Pakhtoon nationalist speakers said that the death sentence of the terrorists be expedited; foolproof security measures for all Pakistani citizens be materialized, and government must announce monetary compensation for the dead and injured worshippers of the last two incidents.